
Better Manchester mayor Andy Burnham has stated he would again a “restricted” nationwide inquiry into baby grooming gangs to compel folks to offer proof so “those that could have prices to reply are held to account”
It comes after MPs voted towards a Conservative name to have the federal government arrange a nationwide investigation, although ministers haven’t dominated out holding one sooner or later.
Labour veteran Mr Burnham stated a sequence of native evaluations into abuse in Manchester, Rochdale and Oldham he commissioned had been “restricted” in comparison with what a public inquiry might obtain.
He stated he was “annoyed” that Westminster politicians had “taken no curiosity” within the difficulty when these reviews had been revealed.
The calls from the Conservatives and Reform UK for a nationwide inquiry into grooming gangs comes after incendiary feedback by tech billionaire Elon Musk, criticising Labour’s stance on the problem.
A evaluate into baby intercourse abuse in Manchester and Rochdale was launched by the mayor in 2017, which later expanded to incorporate Oldham.
The reviews, revealed between 2020 and 2024, discovered authorities had failed to guard youngsters from sexual exploitation by gangs of predominantly Asian males.

Defending his document, Mr Burnham stated the area’s authorities had “confronted as much as this”.
He stated 223 prices had come ahead because of this, with “eight folks delivered to justice final yr, and 26 extra to face trial this yr”.
However Mr Burnham added: “I do assume there’s a case for restricted nationwide inquiry that attracts on evaluations just like the one which I commissioned, the one I’ve seen in Rotherham, and the one we noticed in Telford.”
‘All the time limitations’
The mayor instructed ORIONEWS Radio Manchester folks weren’t required to offer proof to the evaluate staff, including it was “appalling” that within the Rochdale evaluate some law enforcement officials refused to participate.
“There is a distinction at a neighborhood degree and a statutory public inquiry. There’ll at all times be limitations with what you are able to do with a neighborhood evaluate. The evaluate staff couldn’t compel somebody to talk to them.”
“That’s one thing I could not do at my degree.”
One abuse survivor from Oldham stated the evaluate into her city had led to “extra suggestions, filed away for no-one to comply with”, including some victims had not been heard.
Mr Burnham stated he accepts the Oldham evaluate solely checked out “particular allegations”, and he helps Oldham’s Council’s plans to carry a neighborhood inquiry “to offer extra victims a voice”.
The vote on Wednesday was hooked up to the Youngsters’s Wellbeing and Faculties Invoice, which incorporates measures to guard youngsters round house education.
That laws would have been killed if the vote had handed.